What's So Wrong About A Ketamine Orgy?

by Stephanie Maida · November 14, 2019

Caroline and Natalie are out. Rachel Rabbit White's glitter-and-Lucite filled "Porn Carnival" is in!

This week in "What's Agitating Everyone On New York Media Twitter" news, Kaitlin Phillips' colorful dispatch from a sex-positive lit (as in literature but, also as in "lit") party in Bushwick, celebrating the launch of a new book of poems by writer, activist, and glamazon sex worker, Rachel Rabbit White, has fueled some debate.

In the article, "The ‘Hooker Laureate’ of the Dirtbag Left," published, of course, on The Cut, Phillips paints a vivid picture of the alternative, sexy, and straight-up fun literature scene surrounding and propelled by Rabbit White. The event featured strap-ons and stripper heels, cake-twerking, poetry readings, and performance art. The piece mentions Rabbit White's infamous book club-slash-sex cult (which, if you've been following her on Instagram for as long as I have, you'd already know all about), and includes quotes from attendees and Rabbit White herself that are at the same time both delightfully flighty and incredibly astute. It all comes to a close with a cocaine and ketamine fueled after-party (the crew is waiting for the delivery of angel dust) that turns into a cuddle puddle.

It is an epic example of party reporting, which seems to have been the assignment here. So how did it turn into a chin-stroking exploration of leftist politics on social media?

After its publication, multiple waves of backlash followed. There were critiques by hardcore leftists who don't think "community organizing" can be fun (i.e. femme). There appeared to be shade thrown by buttoned-up intellectual types on the "coolness" of it all, and then shade thrown upon that shade by sex-work-supporting feminists. Some coded Tweeters, also in support of Rabbit White and her partygoers, seemed to point to the article's narration, which in their eyes made the whole thing sound frivolous, and failed to mention the fact that many of the people there were activists and community organizers, or that proceeds from the event went to Whose Corner Is It Anyway, a group that supports sex workers in need.

It is true that the "politics" call came from inside the house. "We’re going to overthrow capitalism. Although the form to sign up is kind of complicated," says one guest quoted in the piece. "I’m a dumb Marxist bitch," says another.

But what, exactly, makes drug use and sex a hindrance to the revolution? Why can't a ketamine orgy be high-brow? Plenty of male-dominated (as far as the historical record is concerned) thought-schools and cultural movements reveled in the indulgences of sex and substance. And every major Greek philosopher you learned about in school most definitely participated in an orgy or five.

The issue here appears to be obvious: as usual, queer and femme voices are not taken seriously. They are judged more harshly. Throw in the concept of a "proud sex worker" and even the most liberal of liberals is sure to lose their minds. But if a space provides some of society's most subjugated with a platform, a community, and a few orgasms, who is anyone outside of that space to say it's not meaningful?

All in all: